Standing in a boat in Freeport under the sweltering South Texas sun, 8-year-old Richard Nguyen decided he didn’t want to follow in the footsteps of his father, a self-employed commercial fisherman.

After eight hours learning to make fishing nets, pull up traps and drive the boat, his father, Larry, told his exhausted son the experience was meant to reinforce the importance of education. “It was tough,” Nguyen said. “It’s really back-breaking labor.”

The cuts and blisters on Nguyen’s hands that day fueled his pursuit of academic excellence. So much that Nguyen, who turned 16 in March, is valedictorian of the Dickinson High School class of 2010 with a grade-point average of 4.7.

Wanting to stay close to his family, he is headed to Rice University on a full academic scholarship to pursue pre-med studies or an engineering degree in hopes of someday becoming an anesthesiologist or biomedical engineer.

Nguyen was born in Galveston after his parents moved to the United States from Vietnam in the early 1990s. Before the move, his father had been training to be an attorney and his mother, Pearly, was an accountant. Both wanted to attend college in the U.S., but couldn’t because their English was poor.

His mother is a teacher’s assistant in the Dickinson school district and still struggles with her English, Nguyen said.

“They made sacrifices for my education,” he said.

Growing up, Nguyen’s parents expected nothing less than straight A’s from him. It was a feat he nearly accomplished outside of an 89 percent in English in eighth-grade, the lone B he ever received.

“They stressed academics so I don’t have to become a fisherman or teacher’s aide like them,” Nguyen said. Nguyen skipped fourth grade and ninth grade, the latter of which occurred after he accumulated enough credits to be a sophomore by the time he entered Dickinson High School in 2007.

By then, he already had a goal of attending Rice University on a full academic scholarship. “It’s neat because he’s truly a hard worker,” said Angie Estes, a counselor at Dickinson High. “I’m not saying he’s not naturally smart, but he works hard for it.”

His older classmates who knew that he wind up as valedictorian, Estes said.

“There was no doubt about it,” she said. “There was no jealousy or bad talk. That’s just how it is. The fight was going to be for who’s going to be No. 2.”

Nguyen’s interest in a medical career began with the birth of his younger sister, Shirley, now 12, who was born with bone cancer.

“I just thought the doctors and nurses were great people and all,” Nguyen said. “They just helped me go through it.”

Nguyen is more than an academic prodigy who once simply checked out a geometry textbook and taught himself to pass a credit-by-exam test for the course. A musician, he plays the tenor trombone in Dickinson High’s band. He also likes to shoot hoops and makes time to do chores around the house.

And as excited as Nguyen is about his future, he’s also learned another lesson from his parents, he said.

“Most of the time people measure success by monetary value,” he said. “If I’m happy, I’m successful.”